Paper short abstract:

By focusing on a neighborhood marked by a relevant presence of South Asian migrants, in this paper I examine how devotional and ritual practices performed by Sinhalese people living in Messina (South Italy) trigger place-making processes, “doing and undoing” the city’s social and moral boundaries.

Paper long abstract:

In this paper I examine the relation between religion and the city by examining whether and how religious practices activated by migrant groups “do and undo” urban spaces, boundaries and meanings.

Drawing on an ethnographic research aimed at exploring place-making processes triggered by migrants’ rituals, I will focus on Catholic and Buddhist Sinhalese from Sri Lanka – the largest foreign community in the Sicilian city of Messina (Southern Italy). In particular, I will deal with an old neighborhood not far from the city center, nowadays frequented mostly by foreign people (especially Sri Lankans), and that is strongly associated with urban degradation in common public rhetoric.

In recent years, the main square of the neighborhood, the People’s Square, hosts Catholic and Buddhist religious practices organized by the Sinhalese. At Christmas, a nativity scene is set up by Sinhala Catholics and blessed, while on the occasion of the Vesak festivity the Buddhist monk personally takes part in the public collection and distribution of food – offered to Italian people too.

Both religious initiatives aim to reverse the social stigmatization generally associated with the neighborhood and the foreign people attending it, who therefore try to “reveal” themselves and connect to Italian people, with whom interactions are usually seldom.

Turning the ethnographic gaze to this urban neighborhood will be useful to theorize how cities are remapped within the experience of migration, understanding to what extent religious practices activated by migrants play a role in the social production of shared local identities.